On a Linux system one sometimes needs to check on the version numbers of installed software. Here are a few quick methods for doing so, followed by a sample script indicating the sorts of responses which might be obtained.
For information on your operating system, kernel version, and processor
uname -a
To interpret the output of the above command
info uname
To see your version of RedHat Linux
rpm -q redhat-release
to see your version of the linux kernel
rpm -q kernel
For information on your GNU C library version
/lib/libc.so.6
To see your version of the glibc
ls /lib/libc-*
To see a list of your environment variables and their values
set
To learn the directory containing the java executible
which java
To see a list of all the installed rpm packages and their versions
rpm -qa
To ask an application to give you its version number the flag -v is sometimes helpful.
zip -v
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Here is an edited transcript illustrating the output of some of the above commands:
$ uname -a Linux calypso.sewanee.edu 2.2.14-5.0 #1 Tue Mar 7 21:07:39 EST 2000 i686 unknown $ rpm -q redhat-release redhat-release-6.2-1 $ rpm -q kernel kernel-2.2.14-5.0 $ set AUTOBOOT=YES BASH=/bin/bash BASH_ENV=/home/parrish/.bashrc BASH_VERSION=1.14.7(1) BOOT_IMAGE=linux COLORTERM= ... (lots more) $ rpm -qa ElectricFence-2.1-3 setup-2.1.8-1 filesystem-1.3.5-1 basesystem-6.0-4 ldconfig-1.9.5-16 ImageMagick-4.2.9-3 glibc-2.1.3-159 ... redhat-release-6.2-1 ... (lots more) $ ls /lib/libc-* /lib/libc-2.1.3.so $ /lib/libc.so.6 GNU C Library stable release version 2.1.3, by Roland McGrath et al. ...blah blah blah